Page:The Californian volume 1 issue 1.djvu/32

 "You'll make the riffle if you're 'Chapparal George,' sure."

"Maybe, but I reckon I ken prove my record purty clear." Peterson did not cease to contemplate the cracks and crevices.

"It's a two to one bet that you won't do anything of the kind."

"Why?"

"Because, in the first place, nobody in Mammoth City ever saw 'Chapparal George,' and in the second place, you answer the description exactly. Besides, there are parties here who have an interest in sending you to the State prison."

For the first time since the interview began Peterson manifested interest in the conversation. He ceased his listless contemplation of the cracks and crevices in the jail wall, and turned toward the lawyer.

"Who wants me sent to State's Prison?" he asked.

"It don't make any difference. I tell you that it is the wish of certain parties in this locality that you be consigned to a dungeon-to hard labor-somewhere where you won't interfere with them. Do you realize your position?"

"If that's the case, I reckon I'm in a bad box, ain't I?"

"Not so bad but what it will be easy for me to save you," was the confident reply of the lawyer; "provided, of course, that you will be guided by me throughout. Is it a bargain?"

"I reckon it'll hev to be," answered Peterson, regarding the shrewd face of his visitor with a slight degree of interest, now that he had assumed the rôle of liberator.

"All right, then; and now as regards my fee—how much money have you got?"

"Forty dollars."

"Well, I won't be hard on you, seeing that you've such a hard row to hoe, and that you will need a little money for necessary expenses. I guess thirty dollars will be sufficient. Is it agreed?"

"Anything's agreeable to me," was Peterson's characteristic reply.

"All right. Now, you're my client; and as my client, I shall expect you to be guided entirely by me. Your liberty, and perhaps your life, depends upon the most implicit confidence on your part. The moment you refuse to be guided by my advice, I throw up the case. Do you understand?"

"I understand."

Fogle then left the jail, and was immediately engaged, heart and soul, in arranging a mysterious combination, which he intended should result in the liberation of his client from the restraints of the law. The first movement was singularly paradoxical as regards the securing of Peterson's release. It was nothing more nor less than a plea of guilty of assault and battery, and the Justice of the Peace considered that he had no course to pursue but to impose a sentence of two hundred dollars fine, or one hundred days' imprisonment, the assault having been of an aggravated character. The prisoner had scarcely been remanded to the custody of the Sheriff, when, through one of Fogle's combinations, the committing magistrate received an anonymous letter, stating that the prisoner was a dangerous criminal, known as "Chaparral George," a stage robber, and a more than suspected murderer. The letter pointed out the fact that an effort was being made to quietly gather proof against him, and that these efforts would be frustrated if the prisoner paid his fine, as he was more than likely to do, and thereby escape justice. The magistrate read this letter carefully, two or three times, and a light dawned upon him. He had, in his innocence of the character of the man whom he had sentenced, given a most desperate criminal an opportunity of evading the penalty of his misdeeds, and there was but one course for him, as a representative of justice, to pursue. He would recall the prisoner, and revoke the fine, leaving him under sentence of imprisonment for one hundred days, during which time the necessary proofs identifying him as "Chaparral George" could be obtained. Decision on the part of this astute officer of the law was equivalent to prompt action, and within half an hour after the letter had been received, Peterson stood before the bar of justice receiving a second sentence of one hundred days' imprisonment, without the alternative of a fine. These little cogs in Fogle's combination must have worked to a charm, for that keen practitioner chuckled and grinned, with sardonic glee, as he drew up the papers in the habeas corpus case of Roger Peterson, "unlawfully restrained of his liberty, and illegally detained by the Sheriff of Mono County, State of California." That afternoon, in the chambers of the Judge of the County Court, there was held a quiet little legal séance, at which Henry Fogle, attorney at law, submitted to his Honor that it was "an infringement of the constitutional privileges of a citizen of the United States, and wholly derogatory to every legal principle, to impose two sentences for one offense. Moreover, the prisoner had passed out of the jurisdiction of the Court when he was remanded to the custody of the Sheriff, and the committing magistrate had as much right to drag a citizen into his Court from the public streets as he had to recall the prisoner after he